Salish Sea, Washington 3D Wood Map | Laser-Cut Birch Nautical Chart
How the Water Becomes Wood
A chart is a stack of flat sheets until the water's real soundings tell it what shape to take.
- SurveyReal bathymetric sounding data sets every contour line before a single cut is made.
- CutEach depth band is laser-cut from its own sheet of Baltic birch, up to nine layers deep.
- StainWater layers are stained by hand, reading darker the deeper the water runs.
- StackThe sheets are registered and stacked in sequence, and the bed's true shape rises out of the wood.
- EtchDepths and place names are burned into the grain itself, never printed on it.
- FrameA solid Baltic birch frame and acrylic glass finish the piece, ready to hang.
The Salish Sea in laser-cut Baltic birch, 24.5 by 31 inches: the whole international inland sea carved one depth contour per layer, from Olympia to the Strait of Georgia.
The name is young but the water is one system and always was: Puget Sound, the San Juans and Gulf Islands, the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and Georgia Strait, formally united as the Salish Sea in 2009 and 2010 to honor the Coast Salish peoples who navigated it first. Hundreds of islands scatter across a basin shared by two countries, one ferry culture, and the orca families, resident fish-eaters and transient hunters alike, that every shoreline community watches for. On the chart, the sea's full architecture appears at once: the deep strait entering from the Pacific, the island fields, the long fjord fingers reaching south.
Contours are laser-cut sheet by sheet, stacked by hand, engraved, and finished behind acrylic glass in a solid Baltic birch frame in Dark or Light.
Border on the map, none in the water. The chart takes the water's view.
The engraving spans Juan de Fuca and the San Juans, Georgia Strait, and Puget Sound's full reach. Zoom in with the San Juan Islands or Puget Sound charts.
- 24.5 × 31 in
- Solid Baltic birch frame in Dark or Light
- Acrylic glass front, ready to hang
- Free next-business-day shipping on orders placed by 2 PM EST
- 14-day returns
Live from the water